“Guntry Club” Insurgency Threatens To Destroy The Urban Roots Of Gun Control

High-end urban shooting ranges nicknamed “guntry clubs” are continuing to do booming business around the nation, as the shooting sports continue to grow and reach a much wider demographic of Americans than ever before.

In Miami’s arts district, a new high-end club attracts celebrities such as LeBron James who shoot fully automatic machine guns, then chill in VIP lounges. A Texas range features gun valets. A Colorado club offers custom-fitted earplugs, apps to reserve shooting lanes and chess sets. Membership fees at these new ranges are sometimes hundreds, even thousands of dollars. Cigar lounges — yes. WiFi — of course. There is lots of leather.

The high-end ranges come as the $15 billion gun industry’s sales have more than doubled since 2005. Fears of regulations with a Democrat in the Oval Office have juiced much of that growth, which is now leveling out. But experts also say an industry shift away from hunting culture has helped spawn a new generation of firearms enthusiasts buying up sleekly designed handguns and AR-15 rifles for tactical shooting practice.

The average age of new target shooters is 33, while 47 percent live in urban or suburban areas, and 37 percent are female, according to the National Shooting Sports Foundation, a trade association for the firearms industry. Shooters spend $10 billion a year on target shooting, including the cost of firearms, ammunition and range fees.

Those demographics and economics are attracting investors without firearms industry backgrounds; they see ranges as a new place to employ their cash. Elite Shooting Sports, a nearly $14 million project, has investors from the electronics industry. Real estate, finance, hotel and auto industry executives have backed other new ranges.

Despite the best efforts of deep-pocketed left-wing foundations, power-mad billionaires, shrill gun control bullies, and a biased media, the shooting sports have never been as popular in American history as they are today.

There are more gun owners overall today than ever before, more people in different economic groups shooting that every before, and there is more engagement in urban areas in every demographic than most would have ever predicted… and it is al expanding every day.

“Gun Culture 2.0,” as some have called it, is becoming incredibly egalitarian in practice, not just in theory.

If this “urban invasion” of positive gun culture continues, the forces of gun control are going to be in very deep trouble.

Urban areas have traditionally been where gun control supporters could rely upon a largely gun-ignorant population to see firearms only in terms of their usage in crime. These urban cores have been their primary source of power, but are now under the “threat” of practical firearms experience and knowledge.

The “guntry club” insurgency puts positive firearms experiences in the hands of the urban everyman. Much like riding a bike, one the experience is had, it stays with the person who experienced it forever. While the left-leaning media will continue to rail against guns, residents who have had positive experiences at urban ranges will be inoculated against gun control messaging to varying degrees.